This invention relates generally to a portable apparatus for drilling and shaping tile at a worksite and, more particularly, to a portable routing device which will allow marble tile and other earth stones to have holes drilled in them or to have their edges or faces bull-nosed or similarly shaped in an immediate, accurate and economical manner.
In the installation of marble tile or other earth stones, it is often necessary to have the edges of the tile bull-nosed in order to create a finished appearance. There are also many occasions when it is necessary to drill holes in the tile to accommodate electrical or plumbing services or for some alternative purpose. At still other times, a particular installation may require that certain tile be cut along an arcuate path. It is desired that all of these shaping and cutting operations be performed in a fast, accurate and economical manner.
Apparatus for the drilling and shaping of marble tile are known in the prior art. Inexpensive hand tools are available, but they are slow and neither accurate nor economical to use. Other mechanical devices are known, but these are very large and heavy machines used during tile manufacture. Their size and expense prevent them from being readily available to marble artisans and installers who need to perform these types of processing operations routinely.
Thus, for example, U.S. Pat. No. 123,244 to Daniels and Willett and U.S. Pat. No. 125,990 to Saffer both illustrate large, heavy devices which drill, polish and otherwise process marble tile. In both of these machines, the tile is fixed in place and the cutting head is passed across it in a straight line. Not only are these machines not portable in that they cannot be readily transported from one worksite to the next, but they are also incapable of shaping a tile along an arcuate path.
Routers capable of shaping along an arcuate path are also known in the prior art. Therefore, U.S. Pat. No. 2,428,620 to Huck discloses a radial arm router for use with printing plates. In U.S. Pat. No. 2,482,620, the printing plate is clamped in place on the work table and the router is moved across it in any straight or arcuate path desired. This device is not only limited in accuracy, but again, it is not readily transported from one location to the next.
Although marble tile manufacturers have successfully employed machines similar to the above-described machines shown and disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 123,244 and U.S. Pat. No. 125,990, the limitations inherent in such machines and the need for more versatile and portable means for accomplishing the desired drilling, bull-nosing and otherwise shaping of marble tile will be readily apparent to those skilled in the art. Further, radial arm routers such as the above-described machine shown and disclosed in U.S. Pat. 2,482,620 have their own limitations and do not fill the need for accuracy and portability desired in these devices.
The present invention seeks to meet this problem of the prior art by providing a drilling and shaping device which is simple in construction, lightweight and portable and accurate in drilling holes in, as well as bull-nosing or otherwise shaping, marble tile or other earth stones.
In the present invention, a router is slidably mounted on a horizontal arm which, in turn, may be rotated about the central axis of a vertical support arm. The horizontal arm may be raised or lowered so that various thicknesses of the tile may be shaped or have holes drilled in them. A four-sided tray has guidelines on its bottom surface so that once the router is locked into position a marble tile may be directed past an associated cutting tool in order to shape its edge. Since the horizontal arm may be rotated about the axis of the vertical support arm and the router may be positioned radially from the vertical support arm, arcs having an infinite variety of radii may be cut in the tile.